Category: Game Recap

Weekend + Patriots’ Day Recap

Posted on April 19, 2016 in Game Recap

Friday 4/15: Red Sox 5 Blue Jays 3

Papi stole.

Porcello was decent, but once again plagued by the long ball. He gave up two, and Josh Donaldson hit one about 418 feet to dead center that JBJ tracked down and caught, but is gone in any other park.

Saturday 4/16: Red Sox 4 Blue Jays 2

Dave Price gives up a triple to Donaldson and a double to Joey Bats in the first, but settles in to give up only one more run in seven innings, striking out 9 and walking nobody.

Xander Bogaerts provided all of the necessary offense with a 3 run dinger in the bottom of the third, and the Mayor of Ding Dong City, Travis Shaw added an RBI single for good measure.

Kimbrel struck out the heart of the Jays’ order, in order, to earn the save.

Sunday 4/17: Blue Jays 5 Red Sox 3

Jays’ starter Aaron Sanchez stifled the Sox’ bats, giving up just one run on two hits in seven dominant innings.

Steven Wright once again pitched well for Boston, giving up two earned over six innings, striking out six without walking a batter (pretty impressive for a knuckleballer). He now boasts an ERA of 2.13 on the young season.

Shaw made this one interesting by hitting a two-run homer in the ninth, but it wasn’t enough.

Monday 4/18: Blue Jays 4 Red Sox 3

Clay Buchholz tossed 6.2 scoreless innings, but the offense only managed one run in support.

Koji came in for the 8th with a 1-0 lead and gave up a hit, hit a batter, and walked two guys. John Farrell brought on Kimbrel with the bases loaded and the game still tied at one. He struck out Encarnacion, but then walked in a run and gave up a hit. More on this in a minute.

Travis Shaw once again made the 9th interesting by doubling in a run and coming around to score on a Hanley single, but there wasn’t enough 9th inning magic on this Patriots’ Day.

Trends

-Craig Kimbrel has a little too much Jon Papelbon in him for my taste. At times he’s unhittable and utterly dominant. Other times he starts nibbling at the corners and his control abandons him. Walking in a run with the bases loaded is never a good look, but he had Tulo down 1-2 and threw three straight pitches that were nowhere near the zone.

-The starting pitching was good in this series. Four games, four quality starts. Christian Vasquez was called up for Friday’s game. Coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not.

-The offense came back to earth a little bit after a hot start.

-Even though they split the series, winning the first two and losing the last two feels a lot worse than any other win/loss combination that leads to a split.

Weekend Recap: Red Sox Take 2 of 3 From Division Champs

Posted on April 11, 2016 in Game Recap
Brock Holt is such the man before the All-Star break #BrockStar4lyf (Photo: Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press via AP)

Brock Holt is such the man before the All-Star break #BrockStar4lyf (Photo: Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press via AP)

The Red Sox took two out of three on the road against the defending AL East champs this weekend, winning their first series of the year.

Friday Night: Red Sox 8, Blue Jays 7

What started out as an unmitigated disaster turned out to be the most fun I’ve had watching a Red Sox game in a long time. Joe Kelly took the hill and had an outing that was a perfect encapsulation of his career. Threw hard, at times looked unhittable, left pitches up, missed spots, and ended up getting rocked to the tune of 7 earned in 3 innings.

In Spring Training, Kelly worked on sacrificing some velocity to have better control of his pitches. In innings 1-3 Kelly stuck to the plan, and it was effective, but It seemed like when he got in trouble he reverted to old familiar ways. He hit 99 on the gun in the bottom of the 4th, when the Blue Jays would tag him for 6 runs. He left the game with the score 7-2 bad guys.

But the Brock Star picked up ol’ Pumpsie.

In the top of the 6th, Xander doubled, and Ortiz and Shaw walked, packing the sacks for Brock, who already had an RBI double on the evening.

7-6 bad guys.

In the top of the next inning, the Sox strung together four consecutive singles to take an 8-7 lead. Pedroia and Bogaerts set the table, and Ortiz and Ramirez knocked in the game-tying and go-ahead runs, just like they drew it up. 8-7 good guys.

Craig Kimbrel locked down the 9th for his first save in a Boston uniform.

The 2015 Red Sox came back to win after trailing by 4 runs or more exactly one time (I don’t have the numbers on me, but I think the 2013 team did it like 1,000 times). The 2016 squad has thus far responded well after getting down early. The fact that they always seem to be down early is another issue.

Saturday Afternoon: Red Sox 8, Blue Jays 4

Rick Porcello started this one and for a minute it looked like his start would mirror Joe Kelly’s from the day before. He gave up a pair of two-run home runs to Jose Bautista in the first and third, putting his club down early. One brilliant Red Sox blogger said before the season started that keeping the ball in the yard was one of the keys to Porcello’s season. Gopher balls aside, Freddie pitched pretty well, walking one and striking out 7 over 6 innings. The seven strikeouts are nice, but Rick gets in trouble when he falls in love with the K instead of keeping ball down in the zone to get groundouts.

The runs came thanks to a steady offensive attack (the Sox had 11 hits), and got some help from R.A. Dickey knuckleballs that fluttered too much for Jays’ catcher Josh Thole to catch.

Hanley also “tripled” when his looping would-be-single hit a seam in the Rogers Centre turf and bounced over Joey Bats’ head.

Sunday Afternoon: Blue Jays 3, Red Sox 0

The Red Sox had been scoring at an unsustainable pace to open up the season, so I feel like this was just a regression to the mean.

Steven Wright was great for Boston:

PITCHERS IP  H  R ER BB SO HR PC-ST ERA
Wright (L, 0-1) 6.2 6 2 1 3 5 0 118-78 1.35

Joe Kelly better step it up.

Notes:

-Travis Shaw has an OPS of .859 and is making plays like this at third base. Meanwhile, Pablo Sandoval is batting .000 with 4 strikeouts in 6 at bats, one busted belt on a swing and miss, and has an error in the field.

-Hanley was 3 for 4 with a double on Sunday, boosting his average to .455. Of course, Hanley was a monster last April too, hitting 10 home runs in the first month of the season, and we all know how that turned out. But his early success this season is more sustainable. He’s taking the ball to the opposite field on a regular basis, hitting for average first and letting the power come naturally. Obviously he won’t hit .455, but Hanley’s swing is much more compact than last season, and his leg kick isn’t nearly as high, giving him more bat control. Oh and by the way, he hasn’t made an error at first base.

-It’s early in the season and Brock Holt is raking. In other news, water is wet.

-Today is the home opener, Righty will be there, and all is right in the world.

Mets Win NLCS, Prove Back to the Future II Wrong

Posted on October 22, 2015 in Game Recap

Him? What, is he funny or something? (Caylor Arnold-USA TODAY Sports)

Chicago Cubs vs. New York Mets, Mets win series 4-0

Game 4: Jason Hammel (CHC) vs. Steven Matz (NYM) – New York 8, Chicago 3

There’s not much to say for the Chicago Cubs. They were doomed from the start. Or, more accurately, they were doomed AT the start, because they started Jason Hammel. I feel for the guy, but after a frisky April-to-June stretch, he was downright bad from July on. Why? I’m sure that there’s a litany of reasons, but his lousy performance in the 1st inning was risk factor #1.

For the duration of 2015, Hammel’s 1st-inning ERA was 5.23, and he allowed batters faced in the first frame to rack up a .921 OPS. In all other innings, he put up a respectable ERA of 3.42. And his OPS against was all the way down at .664. Does he take a while to get going? Does he just have trouble against the top part of a lineup the first time through? You tell me, but the Cubs paid for Hammel’s deficiencies last night, no matter the cause.

The game was effectively over in the top of the 1st. Hammel gave up a single to Curtis Granderson and a 2-out walk to Yoenis Cespedes to bring Lucas Duda to the plate, and Duda made him pay.

Before Cubs fans could pick themselves up off the floor, Travis d’Arnaud took Hammel deep again to make it 4-0.

The Cubs pulled Hammel after he walked David Wright with 1 out, and the Mets added two more runs against Travis Wood on an RBI double by Duda. Chicago, meanwhile, didn’t record its first hit until the 4th inning, when a Jorge Soler double started the Cubs’ first attempt at a rally on the night. The bases were eventually loaded with no outs, but only Soler scored. 6-1, Mets.

Just when things couldn’t get worse for Chicago, Daniel Murphy remembered that he had history to make.

Kris Bryant also hit a 2-run shot in the 8th inning to bring the deficit back to 5 runs, but people didn’t seem to care as much about his as they did about Murphy’s.

This was now all a lie:

And that’s a darn shame. Mets win, 8-3, and advance to the World Series.

Toronto Blue Jays vs. Kansas City Royals, Royals lead series 3-2

Next game: Tomorrow, Friday, 8:07 ET, in Kansas City. David Price (TOR) vs. Yordano Ventura (KC)

Playoff Lightning Recap: Royals 14 Blue Jays 2, Mets 5 Cubs 2

Posted on October 21, 2015 in Game Recap, Random Stuff

ALCS

Royals 14 Blue Jays 2, Royals lead Series 3-1

The Royals put a quick four on the board in the top of the first off of Blue Jays’ knuckleballer R.A. Dickey:

After going quiet for the middle third of the game, the Royals offense came back to life, and they just. kept. coming. They scored 14 runs on 15 hits — only two of which went for extra bases. You’re good at math so you know that means KC hit 13 singles, and they also drew 5 walks. That’s a whole lot of “keeping the line moving.”

Royals’ starter Chris Young went only 4.2 innings and allowed two runs, but that was enough given the strength and depth of their bullpen. Four relievers combined for 4.1 innings of shutout ball, topped off by old friend Franklin Morales in the 9th.

Kansas City has a chance to secure their second consecutive trip to the World Series starting this afternoon at 4 on FS1. Endison Volquez vs. Marco Estrada. This didn’t work out too well for Toronto the first time around.

NLCS

Mets 5 Cubs 2, Mets lead Series 3-0

This one was a little more exciting than the ALCS game. The Mets jumped on Cubs’ starter Kyle Hendricks right away thanks to a David Wright single and a Yoenis Cespedes double.

In the bottom of the first, the Cubbies evened things up on this opposite field job by Kyle Schwarber, which also set the Cubs franchise record for home runs in a single postseason.

That pitch is legitimately 10″ off the plate and up. Incredible display of power by the 22 year old.

Speaking of records and incredible, have you heard about this guy Daniel Murphy?

In the bottom of the 3rd he goes yard, giving the Mets a 2-1 lead and ties Carlos Beltran’s record of homering in five straight postseason games. He has six homers in eight postseason games.

Bottom 4 with the Cubs now trailing by a run, Jorge Soler absolutely cranks a 3-1 Jacob deGrom fastball out to right-center.

He must’ve been sitting middle-away because that is an absolutely gorgeous swing on a ball on the outer half. 2-2 ballgame.

deGrom had a similar outing to his Game 5 start against the Dodgers — a little shaky early but composed himself and turned in an impressive performance.

PITCHERS IP  H  R ER BB SO HR ERA
deGrom (W, 1-0) 7.0 4 2 2 1 7 2 2.57

In the top of the 6th, Cespedes hit a leadoff single, Duda sacrificed him over to second, d’Arnaud grounds out, but not before Cespedes swiped third with relative ease. This left Yoenis at third with two outs and Michael Conforto batting. Cubs’ pitcher Trevor Cahill struck him out on a nasty breaking ball in the dirt. Maybe a little too nasty:

New York would add a couple of insurance runs in the 7th, and guess who was in the middle of it all?

The poor Cubs. Obviously some of this damage was self-inflicted, but there were a couple of bad breaks mixed in there as well.

The Mets will go for the series sweep tonight at 8PM on TBS. Steven Matz vs. Jason Hammel. I’d say this one is a toss-up simply because the Cubs will use anyone and everyone out of the bullpen if Hammel gets into trouble.

The Mets will really want to take care of business in this game, because they could be looking at Lester in Game 5, Arrieta in Game 6, and be forced to play a Game 7, which is always a crapshoot.